User blog:Majora5694/"I wonder, the face under the mask... is that your true face?"
I’ve talked about FF7, earthbound, dragons dogma, but I’ve yet to talk about the one game you’d expect me too. Majora’s mask, some of you have probably wondered why I like this game as much as I do, well it’s not just it’s gameplay there is so much symbolism in this game that it’s difficult to find out where to start. First I’ll start with its theme of growing up, when the game starts Link is tuned into a Deku scrub, he’s much shorter and has a constant sad look on his face. When talked to he’s called a child and people ask where his parents are and the guards don’t even let him through the city gates… now for a moment we must go to some of the events that happened in ocarina of time, most of his adventure in that game takes place in the future when he’s more of an adult. At the end of that game he’s sent back to his own time period and turned back to his original age, in Majora’s mask the Deku scrub form represents what Link feels like after this an adult in a child’s body, he feels as if he isn’t the same hero that he once was. On top of that, no one in that time period remembers his true actions as a hero in the future. Soon enough Link finds a way to fight back and turns himself back to his original form, this represents his confidence being restored from the small victory he had against the skull kid, he’s still a child but he knows that while his actions in the other time period were forgotten in this one, he did still save the world and is indeed a hero and that it doesn’t matter whether the world knows or not, he knows it’s true and that’s what’s important. Now for the next stage, much later Link travels to the Snow Head Mountains. There he meets the Ghost of a recently diseased Goron named Darmani. He died while trying to travel up to a temple in order to save his tribe from the abnormally long winter. Link plays the song of healing to heal his soul so he can move on, but at the same time the song gives Link a mask that allows him to take the form of that same Goron. One must remember that this new power not only gives Link the abilities of a goron, it gives him Darmani’s identity as well, the theme here is Link learning the responsibility as a leader. This becomes more than just breaking the curse, but now he must finish what Darmani started and save his people and restore his honor. Of course in the end link ends the winter and saves the gorons, Link even takes it a step further and participates in the goron races and in a way allows Darmani to have fulfilled his last wishes. Next Link goes to the great bay, here he meets a Zora named Mikau who was the guitarist in a famous zora band. He’s been wounded by pirates that caught him trying to take back their lead singer Lulu’s zora eggs. It is heavily implied that the two were in a relationship and that the eggs were both of theirs, Link finds the injured man and can’t do anything to save him so he instead plays the song of healing in an attempt to heal his soul before he died. This once again produced a mask that allowed link to take the form of another, and also like before he now had the duty of carrying out Mikau’s last wishes. The biggest difference here is that rather than having the duty of a leader Link now had to have the responsibility of being in a relationship (and even as a father if you want to take it that far.) In the end link finds the eggs, and breaks the curse on the sea. Finally Link goes to Ikana, the land where only the dead roam. Here Link must use all of his combined ability’s to overcome the stone tower and its many traps and monsters. He takes up what he learned from the beginning and remembers that he is indeed a hero and that he can save the wandering spirits, he knows that he can take charge by facing death incarnate both in stone tower and in Ikana Castle, and he saves a little girl’s father from becoming a monster rather than just killing him off where many others would have demonstrating he knows the responsibility that a parent has to take care of their child. By the end of it all the curse is lifted from Ikana and Link is now ready to do as he was meant to do, he’s saved all the tribes and people from self-destruction now it’s time to save it all from the one who caused all this. The 3rd and final night of the world is finally here, where there should be a festival going on with joy and laughter there is instead only silence. Most have ran but some remain in the town, these people who have stayed either don’t believe that the giant moon would destroy everything or they have simply accepted the truth, that there is no running from the end of the world. But not all is lost as we know, Link, our shining brighter than ever beacon of hope decides it’s time to end all this fear and save the day. He climbs the clock tower and calls the four giants to stop the crashing moon, and when this happens Majora’s mask leaves the skull kid and goes into the moon along with Link soon after. Upon entering, there is a large green meadow surrounded by a hill with a tree at the top. Around this tree are 5 children four of them are running around it while the 5th sits right next to the tree. Link talks to each one and they ask for some of the masks that link has collected thought his journey, each one a reward for helping someone. Once the masks are given Link must go through a challenge that involves him having to seek out the child, once the challenge is complete the child will ask link a question. “Your friends... What kind of people are they? I wonder... Do these people... think of you as a friend?” “What makes you happy? I wonder...what makes you happy...does it make others happy, too?” “The right thing...what is it? I wonder...if you do the right thing...does it really make everybody happy?” “Your true face... What kind of... face is it? I wonder... The face under the mask... Is that your true face?” These questions represent multiple things, like what the skull kid went through and what he learned about his friendship with the four giant’s things like, trust, empathy, forgiveness, and honesty. (There is a certain YouTuber that can explain that far better than me, you can watch her video on that here ) After each challenge a child disappears and eventually all of them are gone except for the one near the tree, the one wearing Majora’s mask This could be looked at as the other 4 children as finally growing up aswell, while Majora is unable to do so he still sticks to his ways by staying as close to the tree as possible. (The tree represents the innocents that we must all give up in our lives at some point, our childhood) He asks link if they could play a game of good guys against bad guys, and gives link the final mask of the game, the fierce deity mask. Link is then transported to a room where he must fight Majora, here link puts on the new mask and becomes what he now truly is, a fully grown adult hero who has learned how to be a leader, he knows the responsibility of taking care of other and keeping up his own self confidence as a hero. He earned this mask because he was willing to give up all of his rewards that he got along this long road, Link now knows that doing what’s right isn’t about the rewards, the fame, or any of that. Even if back in Hyrule his name goes unremembered for what he did in the other time period, none of that matters. What matters is the actual action that he has taken to save the world, even if no one knows it these actions will stay a part of the world forever. “What we do for ourselves dies with us, but what we do for others and the world lasts forever and is immortal.” So that’s just one of the many symbolic themes of Majora’s mask, growing up and taking responsibility for your actions. It’s clear why I love this game enough to have my user name be Majora, I hope this was written well enough to get my across. Xp Category:Blog posts